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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28269747">the faraway remnants of a supernova</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kickedshins/pseuds/kickedshins'>kickedshins</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Voltron: Legendary Defender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Fluff, Gen, M/M, Season/Series 07, also i'm ignoring the time loop bullshit keith is turning 19 and lance is 18, he/they pidge, it's just them chatting on keith's birthday, literally no reason for this to be s7 there is nothing related to the plot, not really explicitly romantic but you know the vibes are sure as fuck there</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 21:21:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,553</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28269747</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kickedshins/pseuds/kickedshins</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“You could ask Pidge to calculate that for you,” Keith laughs. “Or Hunk. Either of them would know when that is. I’d make a countdown.”</p><p>“What, to when the universe kills itself? Morbid,” Lance says, his response quick, their repartee natural as breathing. He leans forward, eyes sparkling with mirth.</p><p>“Nah. To when you can’t make fun of me anymore,” Keith answers. “It’s pretty mortifying to think that that’s something you might try to do.”</p><p>Lance laughs, easy and long, and Keith feels something in his fingers unwind.</p><p>or</p><p>It's Keith's birthday, and he hasn't told anyone.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Keith &amp; Lance (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>105</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>the faraway remnants of a supernova</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>hi guys fuck voltron all my homies hate voltron i watched it all for the first time in 2020 so like. i don't even know. anyway i'm ignoring the time fuckery mostly because i don't understand it so in this fic they've all aged normally. there's really no plot it's not at all related to the season that it's set in it's just that the setting is them at the start of their journey back to earth and they're chatting. also he/they pidge that's not relevant at all it's just in there for like one line. enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“So,” says Lance.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nope,” is Hunk’s immediate response.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Aw, come on,” Lance complains. “You literally don’t know what I was about to say.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, but last time you started talking to us out of nowhere you tried to play ‘I Spy’ in fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>space</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” Pidge says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Pidge!” Allura chastises. “Language.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“As if you’re not guilty of saying worse,” Pidge grumbles.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Look, I think we’re all tense from being cooped up inside our Lions,” Shiro says, voice clear and soothing over Keith’s speaker, and very pointedly directed at Pidge, whose Lion Shiro is currently carpooling in. “Also, almost all of us are crowded in with other people, okay? So we’re on edge.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Speak for yourself,” Pidge snaps. “I’m fine and fuckin’ dandy.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re like twelve,” Keith says, head in his hands. “Please stop swearing.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m literally sixteen, and—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith turns off his comms device to the Green Lion. Which, tactically speaking, is a really shitty idea, especially considering he’s supposedly the leader of this operation considering he’s piloting Black, but whatever. He does not have the energy to deal with fighting today.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He can hear everyone else’s side of the argument still, though. Allura’s mother-henning and Hunk’s taking Pidge’s side and Romelle is being a brat in the background and Lance staying surprisingly out of it all, despite being the initiator of the conversation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith flips off the audio receptors—both ways, listening and speaking—for every Lion except Red. If something important happens, Lance is sure to say something very loud and very obnoxious about it. And if not, it’s Lance’s day to ride solo, so Keith doesn’t run the risk of catching any background chatter from someone else. Either way, it’s relative silence for Keith, which is nice. That’s what he needs right now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After a few minutes, though, silence gets dull. Keith’s used to Krolia riding in the Lion with him, but today she’s in Green with Shiro and Pidge. And Coran’s with Allura, and Romelle is with Hunk, so that leaves Lance alone because it’s his day to ride alone and Keith also alone (except for Kosmo, but Kosmo’s asleep in the back of the Lion) because it’s—</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” Lance says, and Keith almost jumps.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You okay? You’re not involving yourself in Pidgeswearinggate.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“In what.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance makes a </span>
  <em>
    <span>tsk</span>
  </em>
  <span> noise, and Keith can all but see him dramatically waving off Keith’s lack of understanding of whatever bullshit word Lance just made up. “I just mean you’re not putting in your two cents today.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh,” Keith says. And then: “Well, I don’t really care?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance’s laugh is loud. Keith is used to it, but it’s still very loud. “Fair,” Lance gets out between wheezes. “Yeah, I mean, fair.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not that I don’t care about you all,” Keith corrects. “I just… well, Pidge is sixteen. I swore when I was sixteen. I don’t care, and I don’t think it’s something worth fighting over. And I think Shiro’s right; we’re all going a bit insane being cooped up with each other, especially now that we know just how long it’ll take us to get back to Earth. So I think it was just best that I remove myself from a pointless conversation that would do nothing other than tire me out.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeesh,” Lance says. “Harsh.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith makes a non-committal noise. He considers getting up for a walk about the Lion, because he doesn’t really need to do a ton other than keeping it on the autopiloted trajectory they’re tracing back to Earth, but he also genuinely enjoys flying, enjoys the sense of calm and control he gets when he’s in the pilot’s seat, so he remains where he is.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But, I mean, you’re right,” Lance says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m what?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Aw, don’t act so shocked about it, Keith. You’re old and wise and shit, if you’ll pardon my swearing. Also, you can’t act like we don’t get along. You’re talking to me now, aren’t you?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Begrudgingly,” Keith lies.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And you heard me when I started talking to you, didn’t you?” Lance asks, and Keith can hear the infuriating, lopsided smile in his voice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I suppose,” Keith is forced to admit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sooooo, that means you left my comms channel open. Why’s that?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You don’t have to be such— wait, are you just talking out loud and letting the rest of the Lions hear you, or is this a private conversation.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Private, dumbass, you could’ve checked to see yourself.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith checks to see himself. And, yeah, the Red Lion is pinging him on a private channel. “Oh. Okay. In that case. You don’t have to be such a cheeky shit all the time, Lance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s just what I do.” Lance says this the same way he might genuinely say </span>
  <em>
    <span>you are very welcome</span>
  </em>
  <span>. “Also, you never answered. Why’s that?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because I can’t cut off communication to my team entirely, Lance, what the hell kind of leader do you think I am?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In the pause, Keith can basically hear Lance shrugging in that faux-nonchalant way of his. “I dunno. The type that leaves us for like a year?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, my– Lance, come on.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m just saying!” Lance says defensively. “I’m just– I’m just saying. But, like, flattered that I’m the Lion you decide to keep an open comms channel with.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t take it personally,” Keith says, always quick to stick a needle in the highly inflated balloon that is Lance’s ego. “You weren’t getting involved with… what did you call it? Pidgeswearinggate? Yeah, you weren’t getting involved with that, and you’re– well, I don’t know if you know this about yourself, Lance, but you tend to be very loud,” Keith says flatly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Woooow. No. That’s a total surprise.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And as much as your lack of volume regulation can be frustrating, it also means you’re quick to alert the rest of us when something is the matter, no matter how minute that matter might be.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How much wood </span>
  <em>
    <span>could </span>
  </em>
  <span>a woodchuck chuck, so true,” Lance says, and Keith shakes his head in confusion.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m gonna pull up video,” Keith says.</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why? I’m happy enough on call. I mean, it’s nice that you wanna see my pretty face, but—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah, yeah, you fop,” Keith says, ignoring Lance’s shout of offense. “It’s so that we don’t need to talk. I’m sure you’d rather throw your hat in the ring that is our friends arguing than stick it out with me. But again, I still need to be able to see if something goes wrong.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith’s fingers fly with practiced easy over the mess of buttons and controls that make up the centermost panel of the Black Lion’s command center. He pulls up a private video link with the Red Lion, and instantly the empty top half of Lance’s chair comes into view.</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Lance, what…?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, sorry about that,” Lance says. He pops up from offscreen, his hair an unhelmeted mess. “I was lounging. It gets uncomfortable to sit upright all day.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh,” Keith says. “Does it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” Lance says, looking at Keith like he’s more alien than he already is. “Are you saying you just sit in your chair for, like, ten-plus hours a day?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” Keith tells him. He suddenly feels weirdly overdressed with his helmet on, which is ridiculous, because this is literally their paladin armor. Lance is the one violating the unspoken dress code that dictates that they should be geared up despite the fact that they’re just road-tripping back to Earth. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So what </span>
  <em>
    <span>do </span>
  </em>
  <span>you spend your time doing?” Lance asks, leaning forward curiously.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I mean. I talk to my– I talk to Krolia. I play around with Kosmo. I take walks around the Lion. If someone else is riding with me, I’ll talk with them, of course. I don’t find it necessary to… lounge, though.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your loss,” Lance shrugs. “It’s fun! And, hey, if I’m flying alone today, and you’re flying alone today, then who’s piloting this Voltron?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Lance, no.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Lance, </span>
  <em>
    <span>yes</span>
  </em>
  <span>, that was clever as hell and very funny, okay?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay,” Keith obliges, holding back a dumb, unleaderlike grin. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Really, though, aren’t we only supposed to have one person flying alone every rotation?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shiro changed things up for me today. He was supposed to ride with me, I think, because Pidge wanted to talk to Krolia alone about some theories on Galran biology and— look, honestly, I don’t know, some nerd shit that goes way over my head and probably further over yours.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey!”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I just mean because I’m actually Galra, Lance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh. Yeah, no, I know that’s what you meant.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mhm,” Keith says. “Anyway, Pidge wants to talk to Krolia and Hunk and maybe Allura about that, so Krolia’s in Green. And like I said, Shiro changed things up today. So I’m alone.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ugh, younger brother privileges,” Lance says derisively. “Only thing worse than an only child is a younger brother.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith, who is arguably both an only child and a younger brother, feels very personally targeted by this, but also he’s spent enough time around Pidge “younger brother” Holt to also admit that what Lance is saying is true, so he keeps his mouth shut.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why the younger brother privileges coming out today, though?” Lance inquires.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Lance, the whole reason I pulled up video for you is so that neither of us would be obligated to talk to each other. You remember that, right?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sure, but you’re, like, </span>
  <em>
    <span>right there</span>
  </em>
  <span>. It’s like putting a plate of steak in front of a dog and telling it to not eat.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do dogs eat steak?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re the one with a wolf pet, man, not me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fair point,” Keith says. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Also you could just stop responding to me if you wanted,” Lance points out. “You’re not ‘obligated’—” (his tone is needlessly mocking) “—to engage in conversation with me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m not a dick,” Keith says bluntly. “If you say things to me I’m going to respond to them.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s sweet of you,” Lance smiles, his grin nearly as over the top as his tone of voice. “Anyway, you can’t stop avoiding my question. Why has Shiro decided to bestow the beautiful gift of solitude to you on this fine day?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You talk as if solitude is… the opposite of a gift,” Keith observes. His hands tighten and flex around the arms of his chair, Lance’s restlessness rubbing off on him through the screen.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The restless creature in question runs an ungloved hand through his hair, messing it up further. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Does he even comb it in the morning? </span>
  </em>
  <span>Keith wonders. Though, to be fair, not everyone has long thick hair like himself. He’s sure Lance would laugh at him if he knew that Keith spent a fair few minutes brushing it out despite the fact that he’s alone in a Lion in space with a literal helmet covering his wannabe mullet, but whatever.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I mean, I don’t like to be alone,” Lance says. “Like, don’t get me wrong, it’s fantastic to have a day or so to myself every rotation, ‘cuz sometimes people don’t know how to treat Red with the respect that I give her—and that you gave her, of course—”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith just barely holds himself back from verbally reacting to that, but he can’t stop his shoulders from shooting downward and his right hand from, inexplicably, flying upward to sort of pat the side of his helmet. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance, thankfully, doesn’t seem to notice. He continues, gliding past his smooth compliment: “—so it’s good to have a day to, like, reset, y’know? Also—and this sounds kinda absurd, so don’t laugh at me, promise?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I cannot in good conscience lie to a member of my crew,” Keith says solemnly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You know, sometimes Pidge says you have no sense of humor,” Lance says conversationally, which, first of all rude, and second of all, Pidge is a sixteen-year-old who makes jokes about Pythagoras, so Keith is pretty sure that their opinion means nothing. “I don’t think he’s right about that. I think your sense of humor is just dry and mean and occasionally incomprehensible.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You of all people are </span>
  <em>
    <span>not </span>
  </em>
  <span>allowed to call my sense of humor incomprehensible.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I mean, you make me laugh when I can figure out that you’re joking,” Lance says, and Keith once again finds himself upsettingly dumbfounded, upsettingly thrown off his feet. “But yeah. Okay. Laugh if you gotta, but it’s nice to have a day to just… I dunno, refresh my bond with Red. Talk to her. You know?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith very much does. After coming back to the team, it took a fair amount of time for him to feel the same amount of familiarity with Black as he’d felt, and as stupid as talking out loud to a literal fucking mechanic lion makes him feel, it helps. “No, I get it,” Keith says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh.” Lance looks surprised. He’s not great at keeping his facial expressions in check, which is good, because people like Allura and Shiro can be frustratingly unreadable, but Lance is easy. Comfortable, in a way. “Well, yeah. As much as I have chronic need-to-be-around-people disease, it’s good to have a day to reset myself, reset my Lion.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Huh,” Keith says. “That’s… calmer than I’d take you for.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m a walking enigma,” Lance agrees. “I’ve been told it’s hot.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are an open book, Lance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And </span>
  <em>
    <span>you </span>
  </em>
  <span>are a motherfucking trickster, aren’t you!” Lance accuses, jabbing a finger forward with such a ferocity that Keith presses his back against his chair as if Lance could reach through the screen and Keith’s helmet and take out his eye. “You keep dancing around why Shiro’s letting you fly alone today.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And now Keith’s at an impasse. If he tells Lance, it ruins the calm of the day, because Lance is sure to make a Big Fucking Deal about it. But if he doesn’t tell Lance, Lance’ll probably pester him relentlessly until Keith caves. It’s a catch-22.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I… don’t…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Keiiiith,” Lance sing-songs. “You know you wanna telllll meeee.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith sighs long-sufferingly. He doesn’t want to do this. “It’s my birthday. I turn nineteen today.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, what the fuck?!” Lance says. “Dude! Why didn’t you say so!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because,” Keith explains, “I didn’t want you to be all… this.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>this</span>
  </em>
  <span>? I’m not </span>
  <em>
    <span>this</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Shit, is there any way for us to, like, form Voltron and then all congregate in one Lion and throw you a party or something?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t want a party, Lance. I wanted an extra day of rest. Hence why Shiro’s letting me ride alone. Or, well, with only Kosmo. He’s sleeping right now, though; he’s back somewhere in the body of the Lion. So it’s just me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And me,” Lance points out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And you,” Keith agrees. He… doesn’t really want to think about it. “But only out of necessity. Can’t close off comms with everyone, remember?”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sure they’re done with Pidgeswearinggate at this point. You could probably hang up on me and open comms with someone else at this point,” Lance says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m connected to you already,” Keith says. “It’s an unnecessary effort to change channels just to be needlessly petty.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Being petty’s fun sometimes,” Lance notes. He chews on the inside of his cheek for a second. “For instance, I’m going to hold this </span>
  <em>
    <span>not-telling-anyone-it’s-your-birthday</span>
  </em>
  <span> thing over you until, like, the end of time.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You could ask Pidge to calculate that for you,” Keith laughs. “Or Hunk. Either of them would know when that is. I’d make a countdown.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What, to when the universe kills itself? Morbid,” Lance says, his response quick, their repartee natural as breathing. He leans forward, eyes sparkling with mirth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nah. To when you can’t make fun of me anymore,” Keith answers. “It’s pretty mortifying to think that that’s something you might try to do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance laughs, easy and long, and Keith feels something in his fingers unwind. He holds the thruster of his Lion a little less firmly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“For real, though,” Lance says, coming back to himself. “It’s your birthday. Your </span>
  <em>
    <span>birthday</span>
  </em>
  <span>. You’re turning nineteen, and no one knew?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shiro knew.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shiro’s your brother, Shiro doesn’t count,” Lance waves him off. “And you’re really gonna do nothing?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith tilts his head to the side, stretching. He really needs to get up and go for a walk about the Lion soon. The worst part about their slow travel back to Earth is that the monotony of days filled with nothingness gets extremely boring, and Keith’s legs are going to atrophy at this rate without some interesting switch-ups in his daily activity. He says, “Like I told you. I was going to take some time to relax.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Dude, that’s so not the point of a birthday,” Lance protests.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t know birthdays had to have </span>
  <em>
    <span>points</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course they do! It’s a celebration of you for a day, that’s a decent enough point.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And you’d like that, wouldn’t you,” Keith says. It’s a bit of an unfair cut, because Lance really isn’t the self-centered impulsive mess he was when they first met, but then again, Keith used to be a bit of a self-centered impulsive mess himself. It’s sometimes upsetting to see positive traits in Lance that Keith wishes he had. It’s sometimes difficult to see him grow so easily and without external help. Keith had to find Shiro, Krolia, and his fucking self; Lance is just… good at being a person.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance flips him off, which, okay, warranted. “It’s depressing as all hell to spend your birthday sitting alone in your Lion with only a sleeping space dog to keep you company.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s nice,” Keith argues. “Relaxing.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And, yes, that’s true. To a point. He’d like to have a casual dinner with his teammates—his friends—and eat some cake and maybe wear a stupid little paper hat. But there’s the newness of Romelle, and there’s the weirdness of celebrating with his mother, and there’s the fact that he’s still not entirely comfortable letting everyone see him as a regular person. And he doesn’t want to have to juggle all of these factors at once, especially not at a celebration where all eyes will be on him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So alone in the Lion it is. He genuinely likes passing his days this way; he was planning on reading a bit of a book later in the night. It’s been nice to take a bit of a break for the first time in years.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance interrupts Keith’s introspection with an eyeroll that Keith can all but hear over the video screen. “I’m not letting you celebrate alone, though,” he says. “I’ll give you space if that’s what you want, but for, like, three seconds, can you just drop the whole enigmatic tough-guy act and let Hunk bake you a cake? You know you want some of Hunk’s cake.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That is a genuinely good argument. Hunk makes really fucking good cake.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I do want some of Hunk’s cake,” Keith admits. “But don’t you think it’s a little bit late to spring that on him? Cake takes a bit to put together.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Keith,” Lance says, flat as the space between his forearm and his palm, a stretch of wrist that Keith’s held onto once or twice for stability. Keith latches onto Lance’s voice the same way. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re in fucking space and time is fucking fake and if you want cake, Hunk will make you some fucking cake, because it’s your </span>
  <em>
    <span>birthday</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Kogane.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You don’t need to swear to get your point across.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know. It’s effective, though.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith has to admit that it is. Because, shit, the idea of cake is sounding really appealing, especially considering the gang is likely in for an expanse of deeply boring freeze-dried food packets for a majority of their long, long journey home. He says, “I’ll think about it. For a few more minutes. And then maybe I’ll tell everyone else.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Suit yourself,” Lance says, stretching like a cat. “I mean, if you get cake, I get cake, so really I’m just doing this for me.”</span>
  <span><br/>
</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Keith wills his mouth to stay still, forces himself not to twitch his lips into a smile. “Mhmm,” he says.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lance quiets down after that, and Keith looks at the blanket of black and purple around him, a clutter of nebulae and the faraway remnants of a supernova and open, empty space. It’s crazy to think that he’s a year older today. Up here, things like ‘time’ seem so arbitrary. He’s no different than the person he was yesterday. He’s still just one person floating through the great unknown, trying to keep himself sane by reminding himself that even in all this nothing, even in these endless lightyears of blacks and purples and nebulae and supernovas, he’s managed to find a slice of the sky where he matters. Where he’s got friends. Where he’s making a difference.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’s nineteen today—or, he’d be nineteen on the ‘today’ that’s taking place on Earth—and he feels like he’s maybe thirty at the youngest. He feels like maybe he’s ten at the oldest. He’s still a teenager, and he’s still growing, and some days he thinks that it’s honestly a miracle that he’s made it this far.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maybe Keith’ll convene the paladins later for a bit of a birthday celebration. Maybe he won’t. He’ll think on it a bit more, but for now, he’s content to sit in amicable semi-silence and drift with Lance through the stars.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>if you wanna shittalk voltron with me or send me suggestions for my keith playlist (rn it's two songs (back to school by mother mother and little lion man by mumford and sons)) or discuss, like, actually good media with me, you can find me @ kickdshins on twitter. </p><p>thanks for reading, and kudos and comments are always appreciated! xox</p></blockquote></div></div>
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